NASA launches Orion spacecraft

[Tender Branson]

A rocket has launched from Florida carrying an unmanned version of the US space agency's new crew capsule - Orion.

The ship is designed eventually to take humans beyond the space station, to destinations such as the Moon and Mars.

Orion's brief flight today will be used to test critical technologies, like its heat shield and parachutes.



The Delta IV-Heavy rocket roared off the pad at Cape Canaveral at 07:05 local time (12:05 GMT).

It will throw the conical ship to 6,000km above the planet, to set up a fast re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere.

This will generate temperatures in the region of 2,000C, allowing engineers to check that Orion's thermal protection systems meet their specifications.

The mission teams will also get to watch how the parachutes deploy as they gently lower the capsule into Pacific waters off the coast of Mexico's Baja Peninsula.

That splashdown is expected to occur at about 11:30 EST (16:30 GMT).

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-30343171

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEuOpxOrA_0

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

Is there a timetable set up for further manned exploration missions beyond the Moon in the next 20 years?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Shame it isn't the original Orion spacecraft.

[politicallefty]

Is there a timetable set up for further manned exploration missions beyond the Moon in the next 20 years?

Everything I've read has NASA not planning a mission to Mars until the 2030s (which I think it far too long from now).

I am glad to see some new signs of life in NASA in moving space exploration forward, but I wish they were more ambitious. If there was the political will, I'm almost certain we could put a man on Mars by the end of this decade. Unlike with the Moon decades ago, I don't think we should do that just for the sake of doing it. We should be taking bigger steps forward. Personally, I'd like to see a mission to Mars in the mid-2020s start colonization with the foundation of a permanent settlement.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

The problem with colonization is that there probably isn't the political will (in the US at least) for a one-way mission, even if those who go are completely volunteers.